Public responses to fracking panel well informed, report finds

Ian Mauro is the lead author of a paper about the public submissions to independent panel studying hydraulic fracturing. (YouTube)

In the opinion of one Nova Scotian following the fracking debate, the final decision can only be made one way: by referendum.

He or she put the idea in writing to the independent panel studying hydraulic fracturing, whose work this year was meant to help inform the provincial government on whether to allow the controversial energy industry into Nova Scotia.

According to research, that citizen has a point, found Ian Mauro, the lead author of the panel’s most recent paper and a geography professor at the University of Winnipeg.

Mauro analyzed the 238 original public submissions to the panel, not including form letters, and compared them with scientific research on fracking.

“A critical finding is that 238 citizens interacting with the panel were well informed and much of their socio-environmental concerns are substantiated by the available literature,” he wrote.

“While early risk research assumed scientific knowledge was superior to that of the public, it is increasingly clear that citizens are highly capable of estimating hazard potential and the assumption that experts have superior risk judgment is now questioned.”

In submissions, the writers often saw the dangers of fracking in the context of their own lives, describing risks to their property or livelihood. Sometimes a lack of information on a certain question was enough, they wrote, to decide against supporting fracking.

A family doctor wrote, “I am concerned about potential contamination and overuse of public water supplies, both drinking water and agricultural irrigation water, with many Nova Scotia communities already painfully aware of their lack of sustainable potable water supplies,” according to Mauro.

“The municipalities will experience reduced valuations and property values,” another person wrote in a submission.

The 238 unique submissions have not been made public, except in excerpts in Mauro’s paper, which was released Tuesday night. Submissions came from individuals, academics, organizations and municipal governments.

The responses aren’t a representative poll of Nova Scotians, as he noted. Among the 238 submissions, three-quarters explicitly supported a moratorium or ban on fracking, while only 1.7 per cent did not want a moratorium. The rest of the writers didn’t comment on that question.

In a wider poll last year by Corporate Research Associates, 53 per cent of respondents said they opposed the development of fracking in Nova Scotia, “even with stringent government regulations.” Thirty-nine per cent were supportive and eight per cent were mostly undecided.

Public opinion in American communities with fracking potential tends to be more mixed, Mauro wrote. He suggested that was partly because of a land ownership system in the United States that give property owners subsurface rights.

In Nova Scotia, the province would collect royalties on underground hydrocarbons.

“Studies have found U.S. citizens who hold land leases and collected royalty payments view local shale energy development positively, while those who do not receive income perceive the industry negatively,” he wrote.

Some Nova Scotians weighed short-term versus long-term benefits, saying the pros and cons had not been thought through.

“Do you discount future costs (the potential contamination of an aquifer in 50 years’ time as contaminants work their way to the surface through failed casings and cement) to a possible short economic boom over 10 years?” wrote an engineer.

“The health impact of increased air pollution, noise pollution, increased road traffic, loss of peaceful country vistas cannot easily be measured. That does not mean it is not important and does not exist. Impact on the mental health of residents affected by fracking must also be considered,” wrote another doctor.

To compare these concerns with documented risks, Mauro used previous research by the Nova Scotia panel chaired by Cape Breton University president David Wheeler. He also drew heavily on a recent report by the Council of Canadian Academies, which forms multidisciplinary panels of experts to answer questions of public interest.